AFRICA AND THE
CHALLENGES OF DEMOCRATISATION

At the close of the 20th century
Democracy was the most canvassed global concern. It remains the critical subject
even at the beginning of this millennium. Kicking off with the momentum of a
hurricane around the late eighties, by the close of the last century it has
become a typhoon leaving fire and rubbles in its trail as it pulled down strong
holds and iron curtains.

The year 1989 appeared to have been the turning
point in the democratization wave that swept the entire globe from Tianamen
square in China where the students revolted, to the massive rebellion against
military dictatorship on the streets of Lagos, kano and the length and breadth
of Nigeria; from the strident advocacy of Gorbachev’s perestroika and glasnost,
to the crusade and campaigns of vaclev in Prague; from the uprising in Port novo
–Benin, to the strikes and marches in Gdansk-Poland the battle cry was
Democracy.

Since then the democratic wave has refused to
abait – sweeping the pariah regimes of apartheid in South Africa and semi
dictatorship in Indonesia in the 90’s. So profound was the wind of democracy
that Omar Bongo the strong man of Congo explained “the wind of the east are
shaking the coconut trees!”

To appreciate the depth of the democratic
current of the mid eighties and nineties we may have to turn to statistics.
According to David Porter et-al in Democratization (“in 1975 68% of countries
through out the world were authoritarian, by the end of 1995 only about 26% of
countries of the world remained so.

What then has made democracy thick?

Why is its reach so overwhelming, tearing down
physical and spiritual walls?

What is its staying power?

In addressing these questions we need to first
answer what is democracy, its mores, values, its dynamics, its texture, its
essence, what is it not.

Defining Democracy

The dictionary meaning of democracy is a
government in which supreme power (sovereignty) is rested in the people and
exercised directly by them or by their elected agent under a free electoral
system.

Abraham Lincoln called it a government of the
people, by the people and for the people.

Democracy can either be direct or representative
in form, it could be parliamentary or presidential or mixed as in the French
model. The first categorization depends on the size of the space where it is
practiced. Direct Democracy is only associated with the village square
representation as was in Athens, or village meeting in most of Africa. The
second categorization will depend on the particular history of democracy the
nature of alliance, class and group struggle for democracy.

In what- ever way we look at it, Democracy is
associated with how to institutionalize freedom. And freedom is natural to man,
it is innate and in alienable like the late Nigeria Afro beat maestro –Fela
Anikulapo sang “Human right na my property”. Therefore the degree to which the
political system of a state sets the institutional framework for the
presentation of natural rights of man defines whether it is democratic or
authoritarian.

iv)Provision of fundamental and basic Human Rights, such as freedom of
expression, speech, right to life, freedom of association and assembly.

v)Government by law and due process or what is called “The rule of law”

The state must be law governed and no one shall
be above such laws that must be strictly adhered to. Every one must be equal
before the law that exists. In a democracy the servititude to Law appears to be
the only servititude tolerable. In the words of Cicero of Rome “we are in
bondage to law in order that we may be free”.

Another component of the rule of law is the
doctrine that no one should exercise absolute and unchecked powers. There must
therefore exist institutional checks on the power of both elected and appointed
officials, it is this that the French philosopher Montesque elaborated in his
work “Esiprit des Lios” and properly described as the doctrine of separation of
powers.

Democratic values
and culture

It will appear from the above discourse that the
central concern of democracy is on individual freedom, which raises the question
of how to resolve possible conflict that could arise in the process of the
multitude asserting their individual freedom, especially when society is
pluralistic, and not everyone will relate to an issue from the same perspective.

The interesting answer is that it is the very
way in which conflicts that necessarily arises through various individual
attempts to assert their personal group interest that is the defining essence of
the culture and mores of democracy. These are

(i)Compromise and consensus building.

(ii)Negotiations/concessions

(iii)Debate and resolution of conflicts through dialogue

Democracy is an unfinished song, sometimes slow,
sometimes fast.

Though it is true that human beings were created
free and equal with natural rights that are inalienable but the acquisition over
time of the instrument of subduing and dominating man by man over time has made
that which is natural to all men become a subject of social struggles. It could
no longer be taken for free but purchased at a price struggle and vigilance.
Democracy like its core issue-freedom has had also to witness its operation,
features and boundaries defined and redefined in the long stretch of human
history. It is a tree whose root continues to be wet by the blood of its
martyrs, from country to country, class to class, race to race and generation to
generation. Let us travel briefly into humanities recent history to see
democracy’s slow march in three classical democracies – Britain, France and
America.

Britain

Britain best typifies the stage by stage
expansion of democratic boundaries often given momentum by the very enormous
amount of human suffering, strife, rebellion and some times severe reversals
accompanied by massive repression spanning over four centuries.

The slowness in Britain’s movement along the
democratic ladder is clearly demonstrated by the fact that whereas the civil war
of 1640-1649 put paid to monarchial absolutism and transferring considerable
power to the elected house of commons and the un-elected house of lords, it will
take almost 300years 1929, before universal adult suffrage that covered women
franchise would be introduced. The road to 1929 was tortous as suffrage in most
of the years continued to be unified property qualification.

Their also existed a terribly corrupt electoral
systems where electoral constituencies were massively skewed in favour of rural
areas despite demographic changes in favour of urban counties. This increased
the influence of the lords in the electoral system.

During the
Napoleonic wars 1799 – 1815. Basic rights were also suspended followed by
massive repression. The year 1832 however witnessed the expansion of suffrage in
property ownership terms, preceded by struggles instigated by the chatterist
movement; the suffrage now included middle class elements. Repression was
however to follow after massive working class revolts. This repression was in
the 1850’s. In 1867 a reform act was promulgated which enfranchised a large
section in the cities and boroughs. In 1884 the reform act covered the shires
and counties.

The first equitable distribution of
parliamentary constituencies was achieved in 1885; this made it possible for 2/3
of men to vote and 40% of workers too. In 1911 the house of common limited the
power of the un-elected house of lord after a raging battle over taxation. This
was a remarkable gain which left British democracy with the un resolved question
of Ireland as the only shadow on its democracy.

America

In America the process of democratization has
been largely intertwined with the struggle for national liberation from
colonization, and the struggle to overthrow enslavement of black people by
American colonist. In 1799 the American war of independence was waged leading to
the declaration of independence. In that war the battle cry was freedom and
democracy.

The spirit of that struggle was captured in the
legendary writing of Thomas Jefferson in the declaration of American
independence (here him). “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men
are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain
inalienable rights that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness. Thus to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men,
deriving their powers from the consent of the governed”. Thus the Americans
established a presidential democracy, comprising of an elected executive,
legislatures and judiciary, under the principle of separation of powers with
existing checks and balances.

As clear and strong as the spirit of Jefferson
declaration was, its notion of equality did not extend to African American who
constituted the slave population that was 20% of the population of the united
states of America. Infact under American law then a black man was 2/3 of a
white, so much for men created equal.

Among the white population too suffrage was
limited by property and class, infact in most states literacy tests were
conducted, as a pre-condition for registration on the electoral roll.

The process of getting the black population to
enjoy franchise in US was to follow the path of a struggle, which started first
as struggle to abolish slavery secondly to end discrimination and inequality.
The mode of the struggle after the war fought to abolish slavery consisted of
boycott, campaigns, street marches, rallies, sit-in etc.

Apart from black slaves, the women folk in
American were also excluded from the coverage of Jefferson’s high-sounding
declarations for nearly 200years. It was only after the First World War that
women enjoyed franchise in United States of America.

France

The French republic was declared in1798 after
Louis xvi the absolutist monarch of France was executed following the revolution
that began in1789 sparked off by the conditions of France social economic by
system.

Since after the dramatic event of the French of
1789 the journey to French democracy has been up and low, oscillating between
democratic monarchy and even military rule with each era presenting new
expansion in the boundaries of freedom depending on the balance of forces.

Between 1793 – 1794, the Jacobins lunched their
terror, which precipitated a lot of crises. In 1799 Napoleon Bonaparte took over
and recreated a monarchical empire, from then one type of monarchy to the other
took place-restricting suffrage. By 1851 Lois Napoleon launched his coup and led
France into a war of the powers, which saw him defeated.

With the defeat in war the Napoleonic regime
collapsed. Elections were held in1884 giving victory to radical reformers who
were able to emasculate the un-representative upper house in
the distribution of power.

In France universal adult suffrage took a longer
time to cover women and all eligible adult. Infact it was only in1946 elections
that what can be referred to as genuine adult suffrage was introduced in France
abolishing property restriction and gender limits, the road to freedom in France
was fierce; it was revolution, revolt coup’de tat’s and wars.

AFRICA AND THE
STRUGGLE FOR DEMOCRACY

In our earlier definition of democracy we
averred that democracy is associated with the institutionalization of freedom,
and that the desire for freedom is innate to all men. It therefore goes without
saying that the struggle for democracy is an heritage, which Africa shares.

However, the pattern, tempo and the direction of
democratization in Africa did not follow the patterns of the French and the
American revolutions, essentially because the social economic framework of
Africa were not the same as that of Europe and America.

To start with the feuded monarchical absolutism
of France, Britain and the majority of pre revolutionary Europe which produced
severe human suffering and alienation of Europe was not a common feature in
pre-colonial and pre-oriental Africa. You needed such level of alienation such
as that of France where very few families owned the entired land of France, for
a revolution so fierce as that of 1796 to take places.

In Africa pre colonial and pre oriental, every
family had access to land not as chattels and serfs but as freeborn.

Also at the political front in pre-colonial
Africa the superintending political super structure where-as was monarchical, it
was not absolutist. It carried in it features of modern constitutional democracy
with the exception of electoral suffrages which in most cases were not
completely achieved in Europe until after the first world war.

In Oyo, Asante and other Africa kingdoms before
the influence of Islamic and oriental forces, there were laid down
constitutional patterns of governance and established code of justice between
the 16th and 18th century. The criminal justice system was
based on tradition, which are well separated from the legislative function of
the king council. (Both Alafin of Oyo and the Asantene had limitation to their
powers as both could be dethroned or destooled for abuse of power. In the case
of Oyo an Alafin that was found to have abused the office would be presented
with a white calabash by the Oyo mesi-legislator/councilors and would be
expected to commit suicide and abdicate the throne.

Women particularly in Oyo enjoyed a pride of
place in governance as they were represented in Alafin’s council; they also
administered justice as in the traditional judicial system.

Extreme inequalities, alienation and absolutism
in very pronounced terms were to become more evident in Africa, only with the
development of orientally influenced empires or the advent of colonialism which
necessitated that freedom that were taken for granted in pre colonial African
state would have to be bitterly fought for and canonized into a defined
constitution. Therefore it is not accidental that we shall begin our discussion
on the struggle for democracy in Africa, with the struggle against both the
direct rule brand in British West Africa and settler colonialism in Africa. The
second face of these discussions will be to look at democracy in the period of
newly independent state against the background of dependent economy and the
condition of alienation, and thirdly the latest democratization wave of 1989
till date.

COLONIALISM AND
THE STRUGGLE FOR DEMOCRACY

By its very nature colonialism is contradictory
to democratic governance because it is based on the political domination of an
alien ruling elite whose primary responsibilities is to the metropolitan
government rather than the colonized people.

The first wave of resistance to colonialism was
first from traditional elites of pre-colonial Africa. It is in the second wave
of nationalism that modern democratic concepts similar to those expressed by
democratic agitators of Europe and America emerged. After all Africa had been
forcefully annexed and casted as satellite and subsidiary outpost along
Euro-America lines. Semi and budding prototype classes similar to that of Europe
had emerged expressing similar democratic concern of the earlier first
revolutionist and philosophers.

Playing a lead role in these are West African
educated nationalists like Kwame Nkruma, Nnamdi Azikiwe, Julius Nyerere and
other second-generation freedom fighters. For them the question of democracy was
intertwined with the question of self-determination and independence. The
fundamental question was how to exercise power after the overthrow of
colonialism.

In this, struggle newspapers were formed,
political parties organized, strikes organized by trade unions, protests by
youth movements and agitation by women groups. The student’s movement such as
the West African student unions also played lead roles.

In countries of settler colonialist like Kenya,
Zimbabwe, the struggle also took the twist of armed struggle before the
elections were organized. By 1960 most of Africa had achieved independence and
electoral democracies under constitutions that were discussed and sometime
subjected to referendum. The countries that did not immediately achieve
independence were the settler colonial states and the colonies of backward
colonial Portugal who underwent complicated and protracted wars that degenerated
into protracted civil wars due to interference by western political powers
during the era of the Cold War.

INDEPENDENCE AND THE TRANSITION TO AUTHORITARIAN RULE IN AFRICA

Independence and the triumph of elected
government were short lived in Africa. As from around 1966 most of the elected
governments on pluralist-multi party basis began to degenerate into one party
rule or were already overthrow by military coup detas. This reality was later
complicated by increasing interest of the Unites States to act as counterweight
to the influence of the then soviet union which earned several allies in the
victorious nationalist parties due to the soviet support to the nationalist
movement.

The United States as the victorious leader of
the western hemisphere intervened in Africa in some instances by financing and
directly participating in military coups to overthrown the elected democratic
governments in Africa. Such as congo where Patrice – Lumumba, the elected prime
minister was overthrown and murdered, Mobuto Sese Seko who took over was to
later unleash a regime of repression which left his country in an orgy of blood
letting, wars and violence in his nearly three decades of dictatorship.

By 1979 most of Africa was either under one
party rule or military rule. Democracy was on the retreat only to gain momentum
in the late eighties to mid nineties.

DEMOCRATIC
RENAISSANCE, 1989 – 1995

Though democratic rule was relatively
short-lived after independence. In Africa there was still the general feeling
that it is what ought to exist and the idea of democracy remained a popular
concern in what has come to be known as the mass movement in Africa. This
includes the students, youth movement, the Bar, the press, the trade union and
the now prevalent middle class and to some points the clergy and some sections
of the ruling elite.

These popular concern were to later receive a
lot of impetus by a major global development which in future will play serious
role in whether Africa will be safe for democracy or not.

This major development was the collapse of the
Soviet Union and the entire Warsaw alliance. By this major development the US
dispensed with the services of its authoritarian front in Africa which it has
used to maintain some balance of power in the continent since Africa accounts
for ½ of a percentage of its total foreign investment the strategic need to
maintain the “fronts” declined. Devoid of external propist was a matter of time
for the US maintained dictators to “wither away”. Besides the increasing role
of multi-lateral agencies in Africa due to mounting foreign debt and the
dominant role of western controlled Brettonwood institutions has made organizing
Africa and the whole world in a new way other than old authoritarian format of
the cold war era an imperation. Promoting democratization globally therefore
become a component of the US foreign policy and infact part of the
‘conditionalities’ of Brettonwood Institutions – World Bank IMF, IFC etc etc.

This newly promoted democratization however is
not ideologically neutral. As it came with a neo-liberalist category which
include economic liberalization, privatization, devaluation of currency, removal
of state subsidies, fiscal discipline, reduction of public sector finance etc
etc

Beyond the external interest however
democratization is a phenomena, which Africans are actively, participating in.
it was what they elected for at independence and what they were prepared and
still prepare to suffer and die for. For this reason the road to the recent
stage of democratization in Africa has been the road of suffering and sacrifice.

The struggle for democratization and the
sacrifice that goes with it has been in every region of the continent and broad
based. In Nigeria it was ignited by the student’s movement, human right groups,
the media and even a section

of the billionaires in dollars class. In fact it
claimed the lives of the late business mogul Bashorun M.KO. Abiola, and his wife
Alhaja Kudirat Abiola and a septugenarian businessman Pa Alfred Rewane.

In Malawi the struggle involved the clergy, led
by Archbishop James ChionnG who issued his pastoral letter in 1992 against the
government of Hasting Kamuzu Banda.

In Ghana the opposition led by the current
president Khufour were exemplary, in Zambia the congress of trade unions were
unique.

To these continental wide struggles for
democracy must we add the struggle for abolition of apartheid in South Africa
and Namibia. South Africa was a peculiar theatre of mass struggle for the
establishment of multi-racial democracy whose vision and features has long been
in the freedom charter drawn up in 1955 at the congress of people.

The people of South Africa also had the guiding
hand of a old organization with a rich democratic and organizational
tradition-the African National Congress (ANC) born in 1912, seven years before
the Bolshevik revolution. The struggle in South Africa has many watershed one of
these was Sharplville massacre. A protest against the apartheid pass laws in
1960 organized by the pan Africa congress (PAC) leading to the death of 167
people by the apartheid police, the other was in 1973 by the trade unions
strikes and the soweto massacre of 1976 of school children by the South Africa
police, Soweto particularly brought out the struggles in South Africa in bold
relief. School children went on class boycott protesting the introduction of
Afrikan. The oppressors language introduce as a language of instruction. The
protest claimed the lives of over 400 children and that of the pan African’s
leader of the black consciousness movement Steve Biko.

By early 80’s the essentially democratic content
of the anti-apartheid struggles were coming out sharper and sharper, propagated
majorly by the United Democratic Front (UDF) and congress of African trade union
COSATU. The United Democratic Front was an umbrella of 600 – 700 civil
organization who in 1985 came together with the congress of South Africa trade
union as mass democratic movement demanding for a free democratic, non-racial
South Africa.

Between 1985 – 1986 strikes as a weapons of
agitation had increased by 90% while over 700,000 pupils boycotted school and
local authority were in function. In 1986 state of emergency was declared with
29,000 people arrested and held without charge. Between 1984 and 1988 over 4000
people died or disposed as a result of apartheid clampdown and many state
sponsored assassination of freedom fighter in exile took place.

The tempo of mass
action did not abate. However with the defeat of South Africa troops in the
battle of counterna valley by the Cuban volunteer backed Angola troops, and
other international factors the apartheid government began to collapse rapidly.
Development was the release of Nelson Mandela and other freedom fighter after 27
years imprisonment, return of ANC from exile, and rounds of negotiation leading
to non-racial elections in 1993.

By and large by the mid 90’s most of Africa with
the exception of Nigeria, Gambia, Sudan and the states under civilian have held
multiparty elections. In 1999 one of the exceptions Nigeria joined the growing
numbers of states who have held multiparty election and who could be said to be
democratizing. The number makes an impressive percentage of about 70%.

DEMOCRACY MAY NOT
SURVIVE WITHOUT PROSPERITY

That between 1889 and the 90’s Africa achieved
fast track democratization in about 68% of the countries should present a great
excitement, but lessons from history commends only caution. One of these
cautions is that for democracy to be firmly established it has to be nurtured by
vigilance and above all an economic environment that replaces despair with hope
and poverty with prosperity.

Lesson from history instructs us that where you
have democracy arrived at without the requisite balance of internal forces, and
an economic environment that generates the prosperity of majority of people
especially when democratic institutions are still fledging and fragile a relapse
to autocracy is possible. Warning signs can be deciphered from the experience of
Europe between 1919 – 1939.

At the end of world war 1, it initially appeared
that liberal democratic governance triumphed in Europe following the terms
imposed by victors and campaign led by American president Woodrow Wilson that
the World be made safe for democracy following the defeat of the German-Austro
Hungarian and ottoman empires.

But twenty years later after 1919 a catastrophic
reversal of the initial democratization wave in Europe had taken place given way
to authoritarian and military government in most of Europe, sparing only the
British isle, Scandinavian, benignly countries and Switzerland.

The following is the sad chronology: 1922
Mussolini marched on Rome, pilsudslu made a coup in Warsaw in 1926, Salazar made
his own in 1929 Portugal, Hitler arrived the Berlin chancery in 1933 and general
Franco became victorious in the Spanish civil war in 1939. Scholars like David
porter et al (British), have argued in their book – democratization, that severe
economic difficulties, terrible social divisions, and the consequences of
massive economic obligations of the loser state in the war, in the face of
fragile democratic institutions provided a fertile ground for the return of
authoritarian rule and the collapse of democracy in most states of Europe after
world war II.

While fascism was never rationalized on the
basis of prevailing post war economic and social conditions the impact of this
cannot in anyway be underestimated. For democratization and fledging African
democracies after three decades of mostly authoritarian and military rule there
is a lesson to learn. We can appreciate if we draw similarities between Africa
in the post military and authoritarian era’s with Europe after World War 1.

Drawing this parallel we are persuaded to
believe it is not an exaggeration. For most military and dictatorial regime of
Africa after the overthrow of popularly elected government in the wake of
independence of Africa where rampaging armies of internal colonization. They
killed, they maimed, they raped and they looted. They marginalized and degraded;
they conducted politics like warfare, and saw civil opposition as enemy
maneuvers that must be crushed. Critics were seen as enemies to be decimated,
captured and destroyed.

The dictatorial regimes embarked on massive
borrowing as a result of their inability to efficiently run the economy as
self-reliant entities while also embarking in massive transfer of loots to
Europe. The consequence of this is low productive base in Africa, massive
illiteracy, chronic underdevelopment, lack of substantial internal capital
formation, high unemployment rate, inflation and deflation, and massive foreign
debts. In some case the state dissolved into perpetual ethnic conflict, wars and
programs and some the disappearance of the state.

The interesting similarity here is that where as
western powers did not make a discrimination between the crushing economic
obligations of fledging post world war 1 democracies of Europe from the fascist
regimes that caused the war, they are also not making an exception of fledging
democracies of Africa, as against defunct dictatorships.

African fragile democracies are required to
commit massive resources to service, a crushing foreign debt and also required
to mop up available paltry capital, cut spending on social sectors, and withdraw
subsidies in order to meet foreign debt obligation to western creditors.

The import of this is that while Africa is
democratizing, the poor masses of Africa continue to carry the burden of
autocracy in increasingly dwindling social, condition, poverty and squalor.

The fear is that if immediate debt cancellation
is not granted by our western friends in order to free resources for massive
social development democratic institution and their symbol may soon be
discredited, and inertia may soon set in, and a fertile ground may have been
laid for some benevolent dictatorship, or neo-fascist regimes through the ballot
or outside it just like it happened in Europe between 1919 – 1939 or worst still
the increasing wave of terrorism may begin to creep into Africa with every turn
of crushing poverty.

It is therefore in the self-interest of Africa
democratic partners and friends in the global arena to heed to the call of
African leaders for immediate debt cancellation for democracy to survive in
Africa.

After all the people that brought dictatorship
and caused massive foreign debts were sponsored through coup deta’t’s against
democratically elected governments in Africa by the same western powers in the
era of cold wars. To continue to demand for debt servicing and repayment will be
tantamount to asking an aneamic baby to donate blood.